Fire destroys apartment building near North Star Mall

1of 10At least 23 San Antonio Fire Department units deployed to the 100 block of Rampart Drive just before 1 p.m. on January 6. 2015, according to the Active Fire page on the SAFD website.Photo: Mark D. Wilson/San Antonio Express-News

2of 10At least 23 San Antonio Fire Department units deployed to the 100 block of Rampart Drive just before 1 p.m. on January 6. 2015, according to the Active Fire page on the SAFD website.Photo: Mark D. Wilson/San Antonio Express-News

3of 10At least 23 San Antonio Fire Department units deployed to the 100 block of Rampart Drive just before 1 p.m. on January 6. 2015, according to the Active Fire page on the SAFD website.Photo: Mark D. Wilson/San Antonio Express-News

4of 10At least 23 San Antonio Fire Department units deployed to the 100 block of Rampart Drive just before 1 p.m. on January 6. 2015, according to the Active Fire page on the SAFD website.Photo: Google Maps

5of 10At least 23 San Antonio Fire Department units deployed to the 100 block of Rampart Drive just before 1 p.m. on January 6. 2015, according to the Active Fire page on the SAFD website.Photo: By Mark D. Wilson/San Antonio Express-News

6of 10At least 23 San Antonio Fire Department units deployed to the 100 block of Rampart Drive just before 1 p.m. on January 6. 2015, according to the Active Fire page on the SAFD website.Photo: Mark D. Wilson/San Antonio Express-News

7of 10At least 23 San Antonio Fire Department units deployed to the 100 block of Rampart Drive just before 1 p.m. on January 6. 2015, according to the Active Fire page on the SAFD website.Photo: Mark D. Wilson/San Antonio Express-News

8of 10At least 23 San Antonio Fire Department units deployed to the 100 block of Rampart Drive just before 1 p.m. on January 6. 2015, according to the Active Fire page on the SAFD website.Photo: Mark D. Wilson/San Antonio Express-News

9of 10At least 23 San Antonio Fire Department units deployed to the 100 block of Rampart Drive just before 1 p.m. on January 6. 2015, according to the Active Fire page on the SAFD website.Photo: Mark D. Wilson/San Antonio Express-News

10of 10At least 23 San Antonio Fire Department units deployed to the 100 block of Rampart Drive just before 1 p.m. on January 6. 2015, according to the Active Fire page on the SAFD website.Photo: By Mark D. Wilson/San Antonio Express-News

An entire apartment building was destroyed Wednesday afternoon in a two-alarm fire on the North Side.

Fire Chief Charles Hood said firefighters responded to La Paloma apartment complex at 102 W. Rampart Drive around 12:30 p.m. to find heavy smoke and fire in a building near the back of the complex

Firefighters initially entered the building and attempted to bring the flames under control but were forced outside after about 20 minutes because several large air-conditioning units on the roof were collapsing into the building.

“We will have people who do not have homes and who have lost everything,” Hood said, adding that no one appeared to be in the building when it caught fire and that no residents or emergency responders were reported injured.

Christian Bove, a Fire Department spokesman, said there were eight units in the building and that all of them were occupied.

“We don’t have a specific number of residents affected,” he said. “There were two other buildings that were also evacuated, but those were more for precautionary reasons, and those residents will more than likely be allowed to return to their homes.”

The high winds Wednesday afternoon caused the fire to spread rapidly and made fighting it more difficult, Hood said.

Mark Wilson is a staff writer for the weekly, bilingual publication Conexión. Before joining Conexión in 2013, Mark worked as a writer for the Southside Reporter, a weekly community news publication covering San Antonio's southern sector. Mark is a graduate of Texas State University, where he served as a news reporter and entertainment section editor of the award winning university publication "The University Star."